Monday, 25 July 2011

It's not quite reality yet, but it certainly seems like flying cars could be the future of air travel.

U.S firm Terrafugia have declared that their innovative new flying machine, called 'The Transition', will revolutionise the world of personal air travel and will allow pilots to fly in the air as well as drive on roads and highways.

According to it's makers, the Transition is comfortable and intuitive to use. It is also fuelled by regular unleaded petrol making this aircraft a seemingly viable domestic flying vehicle! Terrafugia also state that this aircraft can also be mastered with just 20 hours of flying lessons which is actually considerably less than learning to drive a car!

With over 100 pre-orders already, the Transition is actually selling rather well and is beating all other viable personal flying aircraft on the market. But at £250,000 this thing sure ain't cheap and it's unlikely that London will resemble a scene from The Fifth Element any time soon (unfortunately). So for now, instead of flying to Spain in our fancy flying cars and saving on our fuel costs, we'll have to make do with low-cost airlines!

Monday, 11 July 2011

Ok, so I'm not referring to pilots downing a few brandies before transporting their passengers to far-flung destinations. Rather, the passengers who insist on plying themselves with drinks before taking to the skies. We all get a little nervous sometimes but is drink really the way forward for flying? I doubt it.

Recent figures suggest that as many as a quarter of the 3,500 passenger interruptions have been alcohol fuelled, with these passengers arriving drunk at the check-in desk.

These passenger clearly pose a security risk on flights. With alcohol acting as a catalyst for stupidity and aggression and with security on planes becoming stricter and stricter due to the risk of terrorism, an alcohol ban seems increasingly imminent.

On the other hand, it could be argued that a ban would be unfair for the majority of placid alcohol drinking folk who consume the odd drink to make their journey that little bit more bearable. And how far would such a ban go? Would all alcohol within the airport be banned or just on the plane? Or would it be possible to monitor drinkers and regulate the amount they consume?

In my opinion, the way forward includes screening intoxicated passengers before they embark on a flight and incorporating this with a a limit on the amount of drinks that can be consumed on a flight. If a rule such as this could be used across all airlines then the high figures of delays attributed to intoxicated passengers would surely plummet.